Powers Of The Mind
by Pretentious Chai
Summary: Lately, Dash's mental health has been in a downward spiral, and he reaches out to the only person with any psychology knowledge that he knows - Jazz Fenton. As they delve into an unclear past, the two form an unlikely friendship, and find out why Dash is the way he is. There's more to everyone than meets the eye, even the jocks...
1. Walking In Winter

**Author's Note:** So, this is a weird debut into the fandom, isn't it? I've always thought that there was more to the shallow jock and popular characters than what we were shown. Rightly so - it's a show titl_e_d _Danny Phantom_, it's going to focus on Danny, not on a whole cast equally. But this is fanfic, and we can delve a little into what makes people tick...

* * *

_Happiness is beneficial for the body but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind_. – Marcel Proust

* * *

Dash walked alone in the thick snow of winter, having nothing but his thoughts to keep him company. The night's silence was broken by the distant noises of his victorious team.

He really ought to be out there celebrating the big game. He really should be back there with his friends at some after party, getting drunk and doing stupid things with the rest of the team. None of them knew why he slipped away on occasion like this. Even he wasn't sure what was going on with him lately. He'd cover for himself later, say it was his dad being strict again, and if his voice wavered on the word dad, they never picked up on it. Dash had developed a litany of excuses in case they ever called him out on one. They never did. No one was that observant. No one seemed to care. Even Paulina, who was one of few friends that didn't ditch out on him over the years, seemed more distant lately. Their once strong connection was fading. They used to be so close that they didn't so much start dating as they just recognized they always had been. Lately it felt like he had to try to cross the ocean to get a moment of her attention.

Or maybe _he_ was the one more distant. Maybe all these years of keeping quiet were beginning to weigh on him. She had tried to drag him to the mall and movies, and he'd turned her down more and more lately. The spark between them was fading in typical high school style, and this time, when they broke up he knew it would be for good. That should bother him, but it all felt a million miles away. Everything ended eventually. People faded out of life. There was no reason to get all emo about it. He just couldn't keep up the smiling and quips anymore when he didn't feel like it and if she couldn't deal with that, then he couldn't deal with her. It was a beautiful October night, his team was on top on the world, his grades were holding strong thanks to the efforts of his tutor, Jazz Fenton, even if it was awkward to be around her sometimes with his longstanding 'thing' with Danny. Even he couldn't remember quite how that started anymore. He used to remember it. He had a reason. He had reasons for lots of things. But lately it was getting harder and harder to remember life before he was in middle school. He wasn't sure why.

He wasn't sure why he had gotten so lame lately. The effort to be cool seemed like it wasn't worth it anymore. Dash spent less and less time with his friends and more time in his room nowadays than he ever had before, and it wasn't even prime soap opera season - all the series were in reruns. He practiced football religiously, keeping in shape, jogging around his neighborhood, and yet something seemed incredibly off. He felt like something was missing. There was something inherently wrong with him, something that was slowly starting to break him down bit by bit. He didn't even bully Danny or the other geeks anymore. Some days he felt like it was a miracle he was even able to get through classes at all, let alone keep up with extracurricular activities. There was something eating at him, at the edges of his awareness. Sometimes when he ran as hard as he could for as long as he could he got fleeting images of something, and he didn't feel so alone, but it was gone the second he stopped. A few days ago he had laid back in his bed and even though the alarm clock was screaming in his ears, he had stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours before he pulled himself out of bed. He had to talk himself into going to school that day. He had to look at the calendar to remember there _was_ school that day.

He couldn't quit football, though, or forget about it. When he thought about it, he heard a voice in his head, gentle and half-teasing, telling him, _'now don't you quit football, Dashie. You promised you'd make it to the NFL one day.'_ If he focused hard, shut his eyes and bit down on the inside of his cheek, he could feel hands on his shoulders, feel more than see a soft smile, just a little quirk of the lips with warmth behind it. As soon as he opened his eyes it was all gone, and he was painfully alone. The total emptiness drained him of everything short of the ability to walk. He walked until little pieces of something flickered through his mind, gray shoelaces and a Mid-Atlantic accent and a shattered glass Christmas ornament haunting his mind. The blonde couldn't make sense of it, couldn't tell Paulina or his father without them thinking he was crazy, so he was going to have to work through it alone. He'd had little glimpses or moments like this since he could remember, every winter, but this winter it was nearly daily. It was like there was something missing from his mind, and now it was banging on the door, trying to get let in, but he couldn't find the door, let alone the key or the doorknob and he hated metaphors because even when they made sense they didn't _help_. Why did they even exist in the first place? Mr. Lancer had complimented Dash's increased writing abilities lately - which were only increasing because Jazz gave him a book that explained how that stuff worked in pretty clear cut, normal words - but it was just tangling things up even further.

Dash was going to just going to walk until he felt numb and go home. He needed to clear his head. Hopefully his father would be asleep so Dash could crash in the guest room. His own room hurt somehow, now. The teddy bears, the piles of soap operas recorded and ready to be rewatched, the nagging sense something was missing were all adding up to night after night of splitting headaches and waiting, for what, he didn't know. The guest room had a different if equally unusual effect. He thought he remembered laying in the bed when he was little and wanted a nap. He wasn't sure, but it didn't really matter if that was real or not, so long as he could get a full night's sleep. He felt tired in a way that had nothing to do with football lately. He wanted to talk to someone, tell them something was wrong, but he didn't know who to go to. Paulina was riding high on a newfound wave of popularity now that she'd managed to get ahold of a cheerleading scholarship, Kwan was talking about nothing but his family's upcoming trip to California to have a Christmas party family reunion mash up, and Dash's father? All he ever talked about was how much he hated work, how Dash should be doing better in sports and school, and then it was beer and sports channels until he had to go to work again. They may have lived in the same house, but they were strangers. They had been for a long time.

Lately, only Jazz had asked him if he was alright. And that was weird. Maybe it was her background in psychological studies, maybe it was her age, maybe it was just how warm her eyes were, but sometimes he wanted to tell her everything even though she was just his tutor. Sometimes he wanted to try and explain the inexplicable, put words to this nagging loneliness that followed him wherever he went. He felt like he'd lost something important. If he told her, maybe she could help. Or maybe, given everything he'd done to Danny over the years, she'd call him a lunatic, make a diagnosis and get him kicked off the football team instead. His head wasn't clear enough for him to know who to trust.

_You wanted to make a snowduck, right, Dashie?_ Dash clutched his head as the voice, the ghost of a memory, pierced through him. It was a young man's voice, a Mid-Atlantic accent changing the cadence of the words. _We should get started before it gets too cold. I mean, I don't even know if we _can_ make that._ He shook his head, his eyes snapping open. Looking around him, there was nothing but snow and unfamiliar houses for as far as the eye could see. The noise had faded behind him, as had the stadium lights. He was alone, perfectly alone, so there was no voice. He hadn't heard anything. There wasn't anything out here. All he had to do now was go home. He could make hot chocolate and pretend that nothing ever happened and there was no such thing as a snowduck. (Which there actually wasn't, to the best of his knowledge.) He was well versed in pretending that this wasn't happening. He was the king of the jocks, most admired guy in school, football QB and handsome boyfriend of the prettiest girl in school. When things got to be too weird, he reminded himself how awesome he was and then watched soap operas about people whose lives were infinitely more complicated and screwed up than his. It helped him remember how to breathe again. Spring would come and this would pass.

Unfortunately, he'd gotten himself thoroughly lost. And the one car that was approaching looked the Fenton's freakish SUV. Oh, God, please let it not be them. A ride home with Danny would be a bucketful of awkward. On the other hand, even Dash Baxter wasn't so prideful he would walk home when it was snowing so hard now he could barely think. He wasn't that stupid. Still, the fact that his father had never, ever called him _Dashie_ had his mind reeling, and when the car came closer he stared, dumfounded. Behind the wheel of the behemoth of a SUV was Jazz Fenton, eyes all concerned and forehead crinkled ever so slightly in worry.

"Dash? Are you okay?" she asked, and he was still suffering such a sudden pounding headache he just shook his head no. "Do you need a lift?"

"That'd be great, yeah." He climbed in, and they managed a few blocks in silence before he noticed something. "Why is your clock messed up?"

"It's not. You've been out there for a while. Your dad found my number in your room, thought you might be with me since he called Paulina and Kwan and you weren't with them."

"Did you cover for me?" he asked, a spike of anxiety rippling through him. "Oh man, I am going to be in so much trouble if you didn't…"

"I told him you were probably with one of the other players at their house. Then I looked for you. A week ago Danny saw you wandering around at four in the morning, so… I just sort of started searching streets." She bit her lip and looked away. "You're scaring a lot of people lately, you know."

"What do you mean?"

"You're just not yourself. And now you're losing track of time and walking alone at night, too. Dash, I know I'm not paid to be your therapist, nor do I have a degree, but I have to say those are worrying signs." Her professionalism was somehow soothing, in this context. "Are you okay?"

"…I don't know. I – I – Jazz, lately…" he tried to start. The words wouldn't come. He stared at her hopelessly for nearly a minute of silence before burying his head in his hands. Some part of him flashed to an old car, a hand running through his hair, bright sunlight, and then he was breathing hard and staring at the floor of the SUV, hands clenching his blonde locks to pull himself out of it.

Jazz pulled off to the side of the road, stopped and put it in park. Her hand on his shoulder made him jump as if he were stung. "Dash, please just tell me what's going on. You have to talk so I can help."

He turned to her, blue eyes hesitant, scared. "I think… I think I forgot someone. Someone important. And it's driving me insane. I'm…" _Scared_, he wanted to say.

She squeezed his shoulder. "Okay. That's a start. Look, I'm going to take you to my place, and we'll have hot cocoa and talk, alright? We'll figure this out. I promise you're not crazy. Memories resurfacing at this age is actually not uncommon. I've read about this, it happens all the time. It's gonna be alright. Okay?"

_Everything will be okay, Dashie._

The blonde football star nodded weakly, trying to hide the fact his hands were shaking.


	2. Symptoms In Speaking

**AN:** This chapter took longer than it should have. When you're writing any kind of mystery or working towards a reveal, there's a lot of issues trying to keep it from being blatantly obvious it's insulting to your audience (that was why I hated Encyclopedia Brown books when I was younger) and at the same time make sure you actually hand your readers some clues they can figure out without being Mensa candidates (this is why I hated watching Serial Experiments Lain the first four go-throughs). At the same time, this is all set up - Dash's family set up, Jazz's methodology set up, how they're going to work together set up. I swear we'll get to the meat and potatoes of this thing next chapter.

Thank you to the kind people who reviewed and those that felt this was worth being put on alerts! I'm really flattered, which makes me want to apologize again for this taking longer than it should have. I'm sorry, guys. Accept my peace offering, here.

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Jazz would one day be an extremely good psychologist.

She didn't have a set up like a normal psychologist, but her living room worked in a pinch. It was all done in dark, muted teals and pale blues, which were inherently calming. She made them hot cocoa and had him take his shoes and jacket off and relax a little, and he began to feel less shaky as she smiled at him and came down the stairs with a stack of books, assuring him this was far from a weird thing, statistically speaking. There was lots of material to help them, and she was here to guide him through it. It was kind of surreal, but she _was_ his tutor – he was used to her being overly knowledgeable. She prided herself on knowing things, on applying that knowledge, so this was as normal as it was weird. Things were bound to end up this way, he supposed. He certainly couldn't ask his parents for help.

His mother wasn't even calling him anymore. She was too busy with her latest husband in California. He'd gotten a birthday card three weeks late, and that was it. She was the parent he physically took after, but the last time she'd spoken to him? Was some holiday and for five minutes over the phone, so forgettable he couldn't pin down when it even happened. His blue eyes roamed over the Fenton family pictures on the wall. Some were recent, but they went all the way back to Mr. and Mrs. Fenton's parents and Mr. Fenton's grandparents on both sides. This was a full wall, one rapidly running out of space. A pang of envy went through him, hot and angry. Sometimes, when he saw people with their perfect families, the parents who were always by them for big events, he just wanted to break everything until there wasn't anything to break. Run it off, his coach had told him when he looked visibly agitated, and Dash had. He'd run, smashed, tackled and kicked until his body couldn't do it anymore and it hadn't made a dent in that envy he had for the people around him. He hated people with these kinds of families. He felt the familiar hole where family should be, where he thought it might have once been, a long time ago when he was little and life wasn't angry.

"Okay," Jazz said brightly, handing him a notebook and a pen. "We're going to start with the basics. I need you to write down everything you remember. If you're uncertain, write multiple possibilities down and mark them with an asterisk. Keep writing until you can't come up with anything, but don't try to force connections. Just write what comes to mind."

Dash's brow furrowed. "I thought you were supposed to ask me questions. I mean, on TV shows and stuff, that's what they do."

The redhead nodded. "For other kinds of issues, yes, that's standard procedure. But when someone's forgotten something, they can be led on by suggestions from the psychologist. People's minds want to fill in the gaps so your subconscious will take anything I say and make it fit so that you arrive at an answer quickly. It's usually the wrong answer. Whole false memories have been created in people that way - a psychologist asks, 'did X happen to you' and your brain puts things together to make 'X' more plausible. So for this, we go the safe route, even if it might not be fast. Write down everything you can, without a word from me. Okay?"

Slowly, he breathed in, breathed out and took the pen.

The first thing he wrote down was snow. His first thought was that this in no way clarified things and this idea was stupid. Determined he would not trip up and fail at step one, he bit down on the side of his cheek and focused. Then he started making a diagram tree, sort of like what Mr. Lancer had been teaching them, but bigger. Snow – voice – teddy bear – nickname – snowducks – a beige coat – a gray scarf/hat (he couldn't tell) – Mid Atlantic accent – a room (kitchen?) at night with a full moon, looking at the stars – being held – jokes – a song (lullaby?) – blue glass – watching TV with someone – gluing things onto a flower pot with someone – a small ornate red rug. He tried to draw connecting lines where things linked up, and then sat back, staring at it. It wasn't empty, so he hadn't immediately sucked at this. That didn't make him happy. There was more to this, so much more. These were the tips of a field of icebergs, and try as he might he couldn't see the rest. These were little things. They weren't enough. But Jazz seemed satisfied, judging by her expression. She knew it wasn't going to be an overnight thing. No one's problems came to a close in a single session. Looking at Dash, though, she saw the gears struggling to turn as he looked appalled at the smallness of what he recalled. Gently, she reached out and touched his shoulder.

"As you work on it more, you'll remember more. Write them down as you do. This is good, I promise." He looked, for once, as young as her brother, and it spoke to her big sister instinct. "Now put the notebook down and we'll go over tonight. Tell me how you ended up where I found you."

"Um," he said, feeling awkward, idly doodling on the edge of the paper so he wouldn't have to look at her as he explained the details of his craziness, "Snow just makes this stuff come up in my head, you know? Winter makes me think about it whether I want to or not. I had too much of it in my head after the game to go hang out with everybody. So I just decided I'd walk home, maybe give it some time. Maybe it'd fade out of my head – except it didn't. I forgot where I was supposed to turn. And… yeah, here we are."

"What is that?" Jazz asked, and he paused to look at his doodling.

"…I think it's a violin," he said after a moment, recalling as if in a dream being in an auditorium while someone was performing a solo on stage. It had been so long everything was fuzzy and blurred. All he knew was that it had happened and it had been a winter night with crunchy snow as he'd left with his father.

He wished he could ask his father. The truth was, the Baxters barely talked. They strained to be civil around each other, and that usually meant operating in silence when the other was around. David Baxter was a man who wanted his son to excel in sports and school and that was where his interest ended. He would only talk to his son to reprimand him or talk about colleges, which weren't really discussions. Dash's role in the 'conversations' was to nod, look ashamed and put on his serious face. Other than that, David's life consisted of drinking and watching TV. There had been a time when Dash was a little boy that he remembered being out in the park one golden autumn day with his father and someone else – not his mother, the ever-elusive blonde with blue eyes as sharp as sapphire blades who he'd always feared – watching other kids play football. He'd wanted to join in then. His father had actually been supportive then, not demanding, and he remembered being picked up, sitting on his father's shoulder so he could get a better look at things.

"_We'll all come to your games, Dashie. Just don't forget us when you get famous."_

Blinking, he realized he'd gotten lost in his head again when he found Jazz looking at him oddly. He picked up the notebook and began jotting things down, grateful that she let him work in silence before the details slipped away. They always did, and then resurfaced, like recurring dreams he couldn't wrap his mind around. It had been this way for at least a few winters. Maybe this would be the year that it stopped. Dash wasn't sure if he should get his hopes up, but doing nothing hadn't helped the situation so far. If anything things were getting worse, which he couldn't afford with his grades finally pulling up and his father off his back for once. In the quiet teals of the Fenton house with Jazz's genuinely concerned form hovering over him, he found himself unable to feel pessimistic. Even if it was only for a fleeting moment as he put the notebook down and his eyes met Jazz's, he found himself breathing out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

He went home with instructions to keep writing things down, a silent ride with his father spent gazing out the window, his excuses made to the old man just to keep the peace making the trip bearable.

"_Sometimes we all feel bad. It's nothing anybody did, it's just a bad day. Don't worry so much, or you'll get wrinkly like a raisin."_ Giggles, and his hair being ruffled.

This notebook was going to fill up fast.


	3. Alone In The Attic

**AN:** So after squealing like a giddy kid over the last reviews - yes, Dash is dense, and don't worry, we will **not** be going the Notebook Of Angst route - I sat down to hammer this out while I had time. The result may not be my most polished piece, but it's out there in case I get busy again and there's a delay. There's some part of me annoyed with how little it feels like I'm giving you guys, but as I stated before: I don't want to beat you over the head with the answers. It's insulting to readers to presume they can't wait a bit for dots to connect.

Thanks again to all my reviewers, followers and the general generosity of this fandom. I'm always surprised by the speed and wealth of support this fandom brings forth.

* * *

_"I'm way too old for you to keep calling me that," Dash pointed out from the backseat, getting only a chuckle in response._

"_The baby of the family _stays_ the baby of the family," he was informed, and she turned a little in her seat to see him. "Besides, I didn't hear any complaints when you 'accidentally found' your Christmas present early."_

_His father sighed. "Why is peeking at presents even a thing? It wasn't when I was kid."_

"_Meaning your parents hid them so well you didn't find them?" she asked, getting a laugh out of Dash as his father looked out the windshield._

"_I take the fifth," he muttered. Then, more clearly, he said, "Are you sure you'll be alright? You know we can come pick you up if anything goes wrong."_

"_David, please. It's just work. I go in, do the job, get at least a dozen lectures by people, and then I leave. I've done it before. It's stressful, but I can deal with it. It's actually better than working where I used to live – or at least, it's safer." That last part was whispered, something Dash wasn't supposed to hear. She turned around to look at him as they stopped at a red light. "Stay out of trouble. I take it when I'm not there to see your father's face."_

"_Thanks," David said at the same time Dash said, "Sure."_

_As the car moved on through the snowing evening, Dash watched the city pass him by, bigger than Amity and yet more spread out. It was an intimidating place, but, as he held the teddy bear he'd gotten closer to him, he had to admit it was also pretty interesting. Maybe she'd have fun here even though she'd be working. They had nicer Christmas lights than home, anyway, and there were more police cars than he normally saw. He guessed if he had to do her job this did seem a lot safer than home._

_But since when had home been dangerous, anyway?_

* * *

Dash woke up and wrote everything down. In his haste to get to his notebook, he fell out of bed, legs tangled in the sheets, and didn't even slow down.

Dreams faded very quickly, more or less the second he woke up. It wasn't uncommon for him to have a nightmare or dream he forgot by the time he got to the bathroom. So frantic scribbling ensued, as well as a call to Jazz who, with her trademark calm, proceeded to analyze his dream to see what leads they might come up with from it. The results were, unfortunately, more than a little disappointing. Even suggesting something might mean something could lead Dash onto the wrong path and make him draw incorrect conclusions. On top of that, it was simply too much of a minor moment to pull much from. Amity Park's economy hadn't been doing well in the past, so it wasn't unusual for people to pick up side jobs or brief bits of work somewhere else, and 'a big city' hardly narrowed the location down. He started pacing his room, irritated.

"This kind of stuff takes more than a night," Jazz reminded him gently, and he groaned. Over the phone it sounded like a rush of static. "If it helps, I remember there was a point city budget cuts made the police force downsize. If we look for what year that was-"

"That's not it," he said firmly, not knowing why. "No, that's not… I can't explain why that's not it, but it's not."

"That's a good thing, actually. It means your mind is starting to lock in on what actually happened, even if it's just ruling out impossibilities. Keep at it, okay? I'm… busy, this weekend."

Dash raised an eyebrow. He'd never heard 'ugh' expressed so thoroughly in a tone of voice. "You sound like you'd rather be hit by a bulldozer. Family problems?"

"Worse. We're all going to spend a weekend with my dad's old college buddy. Who has a major crush on my mom." She nodded, though it could not be seen, as Dash paused to process that. "I know. It's really awkward and gross. Do me a favor and _call me_ when things come up. I need every distraction I can get."

"Will do." He only had to flash to how he felt whenever his mom mentioned her latest husband or boyfriend – sometimes she had both going on at the same time – to understand fully Jazz's horror. "Do what I do and bring a teddy bear along. It'll make it more bearable."

"Bearbert's already packed," she said, and then _realized_ what she'd said. "…um."

"Um," came his highly intelligent reply. "Uh. So. What's your cell number?"

They exchanged numbers and hung up, mutually prepared to pretend they were not both still in possession of teddy bears at their ages. It was a shallow denial, but both of them were very good at clinging to their projected public image, so they stuck with it.

Left with little else to do, Dash went up into the attic, that dusty place where all things Baxter went to die a slow, painful, sometimes moldy death.

He wasn't sure what he was looking for, to be honest. He was relying on the old idea of knowing what it was when he saw that. In addition, family photos would be good, but he couldn't honestly recall if that was a thing they did. Dash had very carefully made a life for himself where he didn't have to acknowledge the gaps in his memory were growing instead of shrinking. He had always filled up his time so everything felt okay. Actually admitting things weren't had been an act of instinct and desperation, one that he normally wouldn't have undertaken. Now that he had, he felt both relieved and weighed down. He had to do something, anything at all – it was just who he was. He needed to do something to work on this. Dash didn't do well when told to sit tight and do nothing. Even when he slacked off, that slacking off had a plan. So he stood amongst the piles of boxes, old broken furniture, and shelves of discarded books, and decided that he was going to pull something important from this experience if it took all day.

Six hours later he had made multiple trips outside to dump moldy and rotted things into the trash cans of his neighbors once his own had run out of room, had organized all of the things that he could salvage – some trunks managed to be rot-proof, and so he hauled them clear of disaster zones – and had scrubbed at the whole place with cleaners of every kind, to the point he had to crack open the window to keep the air breathable. His father had come up at one juncture to see what was going on, but had stayed frozen at the top of the stairs for a long moment before leaving to pour himself a fifth of vodka. He left without a word, so Dash knew he wasn't going to help. Then again, his dad never helped with anything, so did it matter? He hadn't been delusional enough to think anything was going to make David freaking Baxter come help him out. The attic was big and though he put in texts to Jazz, they were mostly exchanges of mutual boredom, coupled with the occasional joke. Kwan called him at the six and a half hour mark, and Dash sat down on an old bed in the attic, grateful for a reason to take a break.

"Hey, Kwan," he said, slightly clogged up from the cleaning chemicals. "How are things?"

"Awesome! Terrible!" Kwan replied enthusiastically, and then lowered his voice to a whisper. "So we're all going to Santa Clarita, right? And that means my cousin Cam is there. And her friend Huyen is going to be there and _she is amazing_. She's the perfect girl. I've been texting her all day and she's so cool and-"

"Bro, we've been over this: when you like a girl, ask her out. Movies work, and so does slumming around the mall. It isn't rocket science." Dash had explained this to him during the Valerie era as well. It never sank in.

"But Dash, I have every uncle, aunt, cousin and everything else there! How am I supposed to get away and hang out with her even if she says yes?"

Huh. That was actually a decent question. "I dunno. Try Paulina. She's the one who plans dates and she's pretty good at it. She helped you and Valerie out, remember?"

"Well, yeah, I guess. I just… I don't know, man, I didn't want to get in the middle of your situation."

"My situation?" Dash asked, quirking an eyebrow even though there was no one there to see him.

"Yeah. I mean, you and Paulina, you're like half-broken up." Kwan waited for a reaction, and getting none, said, "Um, I thought you knew."

"_So what exactly _are_ you and Dad?" Dash asked, holding Barry the Ripper to him, examining the bear's tiny mask and long cape and cane. He was sitting, so he didn't see her reaction, if any. "Are you his best friend?"_

"…_excuse me, Dashie. I have to go talk to David. I – I thought you knew."_

"Dash? Bro? Are you okay?" Kwan snapped him out of it, but Dash shook his head mutely for a moment until he realized he was on the phone.

"No. Not really. Can I call you back? Or, y'know, text me later. Go talk to Paulina. I'm – I have a lot to think about."

He hung up without waiting for a confirmation, and went to go get his notebook. He wrote everything down, the teddy bear, the soft light of a lazy autumn evening as they sat in a big room, some awful country song playing from the little yellow radio he had. Then he went back up to the attic to keep cleaning, but something had shifted. Things needed to go places. The desk went over there, and so did the lamp, and the bed was supposed to have curtains around it – he found the bars for it and fixed them into place, the old curtains musty but not moldy. There was supposed to be a large cream rug, oval shaped, on the floor. He found it wrapped in plastic and laid it down, then pushed the bookcases until they were all against the wall opposite of the door. That left a sizable area, enough a person could live here. He found the soft silver comforter for the bed wrapped up too, along with a bunch of scarves. On instinct, he put them on the coat rack he'd found, and positioned it between the bed and desk. Finding the wardrobe wasn't hard with the pile of things so decimated, and he pushed it by the coat rack. On instinct, he tried to open it, but it was jammed.

All that was left were boxes now numbering in only the dozens, and a full bedroom.

Dash didn't even bother writing it down, he took a picture with his cellphone and sent it to Jazz along with an explanation of what had happened. Then he sat on the cream rug and looked around. Not everything was in place. Some things were missing. The red rug that was supposed to be facing the southeast was. Maybe a lot of other things were missing too, he didn't know. He wasn't sure he could even spell his own name, his head was spinning so hard. He'd _been here_ before. He'd sat on this carpet and watched a TV sitting on a low table. He had watched football here and flailed his arms and cheered.

_Are you gonna join the NFL, Dashie?_

"Yes," he said to the empty room, feeling exhausted. He swore he could see a face turn towards him and big brown eyes crinkle in a smile. "Promise you'll come watch me?"

_Promise! Cross my heart and hope to die. Death via a thousand angry dragonflies._

Laughter that wasn't his echoed through the room.

* * *

"Hey," Jazz said softly to Dash, the phone clutched to her ear as she stood outside on the balcony Vlad had on his ridiculous rooms. "Hey. Just breathe, okay?"

"I thought you said it wasn't going to be like this! It was supposed to take time!" he half-shouted. "It feels like I just got hit over the head with a baseball bat! That's not subtle, that's not a scribble in a note book, Fentoni!"

"Fentonatti," she corrected, and the weirdness of this statement threw him for a moment.

"Huh?"

"Our great grandfather was Leone Fentonatti. Got his name changed to Leon Fenton when he went through Ellis Island." She idly traced patterns in the snow on the balcony's ledge, satisfied she'd thrown him off enough to help him gather his thoughts anew. "And _I know_. I know this isn't a scribble in a notebook, okay? I would _never_ say that about this." Her voice was serious and concerned and he hated that, because it left him with no one to be angry at. "This is the most serious psychological endeavor I've ever been a part of. You're top priority to me right now. So just breathe, and try to hang on while I try and sort this out. This is happening a lot faster than anything I've ever read indicated it was supposed to."

"Well, great. What am I supposed to do now?"

"Let it lie. No more pursuing anything unless I'm there. Try to relax. I'm not going to have you digging through this on your own."

"I can't just sit here. I need something to distract me and soap operas aren't working. I need somebody to actually _be_ here, Fentonatti. I need you." He cringed. "Not – not like _that_, jeez. That came out wrong."

Jazz looked out at the snowy wilderness around her, nodding even though he wasn't there. "I get it. I miss you, too."

"Really?"

"I'm surprised too. But you're so blunt. I don't think you've ever lied about anything, even to be polite. Acting like everything's fine, when we all know it's not, it's – it's exhausting. I want to be back in our tutoring sessions with you telling me something is retarded and useless. At least then I know what's really going on." She breathed in the clear mountain air and longed for the slightly stale air of Amity Park. Every moment like this was a Danny vs Vlad fight waiting to happen. The only thing that might prevent that was their mother being exceptionally on edge and trying to convince Jack to cut this weekend short. "At least I can do something for you. I can't do anything here, not really. So just… keep texting and calling. And I'll stay up." She had to in case Danny and Vlad got into it. "I'll be right here when you need me."

"Everything's all messed up. The second you get back, call me. I don't have any support over here. You've met my dad, after all."

The redhead made a 'hmm' noise. "What about Paulina?"

"She's dating Brody," he announced, sounding like he was still processing it. "As Thomas Brody. The punk kid on the debate team – Star told me. I've been told it was obvious but nobody wanted to tell me and wreck me emotionally for the football season. Apparently there's also the assumption I somehow knew that _Paulina Sanchez_ and the kid who boycotts things made in China and has a political blog were somehow hooking up behind my back."

"Dash…"

"It's cool. I'm going insane. It's not fair to 'Lina to ask her to stay with me. Would you? I used to smuggle beer into the movie theater with the guys and then movie hop to go see a chick flick with her. Now I don't even _know_ what I do."

"What about Star? Could you hang out with her?"

"Her parents have the whole Wicca thing going on, remember? Yule is now. I think. Or at least close enough she's busy. Everyone's busy. They have _families_. They've got to pack for things and decorate the house and cook foods and get some last second dates in. They have gifts to get people and shopping to do. They're going to sit down on at least one day and be with a bunch of people who will actually know and care about them instead of sitting around and eating a microwave turkey dinner while their family gets too drunk to dream!"

"Dash, are you crying? …Dash?"

"Get home," he said, voice strained. "I can't do this emo BS. Just. Get home. I'm gonna get some rest."

"Alright," she replied carefully,trying to keep the nervousness out of her voice. "Call me."

"Yeah."

He hung up and made his way to the kitchen, where the vodka bottle hadn't even been put away, and proceeded to make sure that sleep came whether he liked it or not, and chalking up any gagging to the taste.


End file.
